Norwich school board reduces its budget by $1.18M

On Tuesday night, the Board of Education needed to cut $1.36 million from its operating budget for the new fiscal year to align with a $70.53 million school budget the City Council approved last month.

On Tuesday night, the Board of Education needed to cut $1.36 million from its operating budget for the new fiscal year to align with a $70.53 million school budget the City Council approved last month.

The first $1.18 million worth of reductions were seamless — but battle lines were drawn over the remaining $180,000. It’s clear those funds will come from salaries, but whose remains the question.

Under the budget adjustments made Tuesday, there is $4.6 million for support salaries, including $189,000 to pay for school resource officers.

Should the state approve Norwich’s $2.3 million Alliance District application, officials plan to implement full-day kindergarten at John B. Stanton, Wequonnoc and Uncas elementary schools.

The program could be offered at the city’s three other elementary schools for about the same amount as it costs for the resource officers.

“I’m not going to vote to cut four teachers when they’re still in the budget,” board member Jesshua Ballaro said.

“We’re in the business to teach. The city’s responsibility is to keep us safe.”

School board member Dennis Slopak, agreed.

“I would rather see more teachers than the SROs,” he said. “If we have to lose something, I’d rather lose that, too.”

The board will convene again in a few weeks once district administrators know much aid they’ll be getting from the state Department of Education’s Alliance District program to determine where the $180,000 cut will be made.

Superintendent Abby Dolliver told the board that she isn’t sure at this point whether the reductions will come from teachers or other staff. Administrators estimated that the $180,000 loss would mean the loss of about four positions.

Combined, the board cut $1.18 million from this year’s budget, including $440,000 in new positions that would have restored previously eliminated programs, such as world languages or music.

It also removed $344,000 in special education fees to Norwich Free Academy, putting the onus on the city to make up the difference through an excess cost grant.

On June 10, the City Council adopted a $116.3 million 2013-14 budget that included $1.37 million less for education spending than the Board of Education had said it needed in March to cover a 4 percent tuition increase from Norwich Free Academy.

As a concession, city leaders raised the school district’s spending amount to $70.53 from the $70.38 million City Manager Alan Bergren proposed.

A Monday decision by the council to pay for $502,000 worth of capital improvement bonds for the school system spared about eight positions, but educators have already seen attrition because of the budget uncertainty, with four non-tenured teachers taking jobs elsewhere, Dolliver said.

“People want to know if they have a job, and parents want to know who’s in our schools,” she said.